by Dave Dobson
“Stew,” said Boog.
“Whuh?” I replied.
“Stew, Marty. It’s stew.” Boog pulled something off my cheek. A large slice of carrot. I stuck out my tongue and licked my face. Salty, but good. Needed something –– maybe more tomatoes.
“Let’s go,” shouted Boog. He vaulted the bar, his staff in one hand. I clambered over it after him.
We needn’t have hurried. As we entered the kitchen, I stumbled over an embroidered boot. We passed the upended stew pot among the other dishes, spoons, and cutlery scattered on the floor. As we neared the tavern’s back door, the floor took on a reddish hue, and we began to see bits of charred flesh and bone mixed with expensive, gaudy shreds of orange and red fabric. The air was smoky and the odor oppressive. We found most of a leg. I felt a bit light-headed, but Boog pressed on undaunted.
On the floor of the kitchen, in the center of a torn and smoking red jacket, lay the pendant Stennis had kept from the mysterious scarred woman. It was clean, untouched, and it no longer danced or screamed. The talisman at the end of the chain was of a strange design – a metal ring containing two symbols. On the right was a moon of beaten silver, and on the left, a sunburst of gold, peeking out from behind the moon.
Boog went over to one side and picked up something. I glanced over and immediately wished I hadn’t. Boog put it down and pulled a few long, brown, oily, curly hairs off his hand. “Looks like we caught him, Marty.”
I nodded, not trusting my voice, and sighed. This was going to be hard to explain. It’s not every day your prisoner explodes.
2
Bar Examination
It took us several hours to sort out the situation. First off, I ordered everyone to stay at the tavern. Given the recent display of sorcery, the fight, and the unfortunate thunderous demise of Stennis, this was not a popular idea. I wondered if I might suffer either disobedience or bodily harm, until I hit upon the grand scheme of using one of Stennis’ coins to buy a few rounds of ale for the surly patrons. Their resulting inebriation sometimes helped and sometimes hindered our questioning, but the important thing was that the Swan’s inhabitants no longer wanted to rip me limb from limb.
Boog ducked outside and gave a girl a copper to summon the city guard. I wiped off the stew as best I could. While we waited for our support, we questioned the bartender and the regular patrons. With my charming manner and incisive intellect, we made some real progress. It also helped that Boog stood next to me fiddling with his staff.
The bartender was a good source. Sable told us the mysterious sorceress first arrived a week and a half ago. She sought out Stennis right away, on the first night. They didn’t know each other before that night, but they spoke a great deal then and for the next few nights. The bartender didn’t know the woman’s name. Early on, the woman put some silver on deposit to pay for food and drink, enough for a few weeks. She spoke with a northern accent when she spoke at all, and she seemed like a decent person. She worked no magic before tonight. Her drink of choice was Gortian bloodwine, and Sable had tracked some down a few days previously.
An old man with few teeth, a regular at the Swan, said that he’d once heard Stennis call the woman Novara. He also recalled that this Novara frequently wore a pendant like the one Stennis had, which now lay on the bar in front of me. I was a bit reluctant to touch it given its recent history. The old man didn’t think this was the same one Novara had worn. I thought he was probably right, because this matched one of the pieces of jewelry Countess Moriff reported stolen a week earlier. We had more than enough evidence now to place Stennis as the thief, especially after his face had appeared in the Augur’s Pool back at headquarters.
We asked several other patrons but learned little else of interest about Novara. No one recalled Stennis having much money recently, but one serving maid recalled seeing Novara and Stennis conferring the previous night at a table in the back, and she thought she saw Novara push a purse across the table to Stennis at one point. She remembered that Stennis had given her a silver coin as a gratuity at closing time, and she proudly produced the coin, probably more than she made in a week serving the wretched population of the Swan. The trident stamped on the side showed that it was of Gortian origin.
This prompted us to check the contents of Stennis’ pouch, still sitting on the bar. Boog picked it up and rather indelicately dumped its contents on the stew-covered counter. The room quieted a bit, this silence followed by a great deal of whispering. There must have been nearly fifty gold coins there with a number of other lesser ones. Sable's eyes bulged, and the serving maid’s pride at her silver coin seemed to evaporate somewhat. Almost all of the coins bore the Gortian trident, which was quite rare here in Frosthelm.
“Is that a fair price?” asked Boog. “For the jewels?” He glared at the other patrons, hopefully quashing any ideas they had of liberating the treasure.
“Hard to say,” I replied. “From what her ladyship Moriff said, many of them are very rare – black pearls, fire emeralds from Zindis, and a number of other stones and pieces of more sentimental value. They’re worth much more than that on the open market, but they’d be hard to sell. Maybe as stolen goods, this is fair. And who knows what Stennis would take for them?"
Boog grunted and began scooping the coins back into the pouch, apparently oblivious to the muttering and neck craning going on behind him. “I’m guessing this is Stennis’ fee, and that Novara has the jewels. All except the one thing she wanted most.” He gestured at the moon and sun pendant on the bar.
I nodded, chewing my lip. “But why’s the pendant so important to her? What’s it for?”
“Blowing up Stennis?” replied Boog.
“Could be,” I said, remembering how the pendant had glowed and danced after Novara’s departure. Could Novara’s spell have triggered the explosion? “But that can’t be what Novara wanted it for. Neither of them knew we were here, or that we were going to interfere with them. And Novara definitely didn’t want Stennis to keep it.” I rubbed my eyes, still stinging from the smoke and the stew. “Also, why does Novara have one like it? I doubt she wants to explode herself.”
“Well, something had to blow up Stennis. I don’t think it was the food here, though I’m not ruling that out.” Sable glowered at Boog. “And the pendant has to be enchanted – it glowed, and it survived the explosion unharmed.”
I stretched. “What was that business about the chicken?” I wiggled my fingers.
“Chicken?” asked Boog, incredulous.
I signed to him. Chicken is love. You idiot.
Boog slapped his forehead. “Agh. Trap. Set. The trap is set. I forgot the pinkie.” He looked at his traitorous fingers with disgust. “I always get those mixed up.”
There was a commotion at the door, and several armed guards pushed through. I knew the sergeant, Serena Wolfhorn. She wasn’t a pleasant woman, but she’d handle the crowd here with her typical competence. She pushed through the patrons to us.
“Inspectors.” She nodded at us.
“Sergeant Wolfhorn,” I replied.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
Boog spoke up. “We were observing two people, one a thief under warrant, male, the other an unknown foreigner, female. When we tried to arrest them, the foreigner used magic to escape, and the thief fought us.”
The sergeant looked at Boog, and then appraised my physique. “You won?”
I felt heat come to my cheeks. “Boog disarmed him, and then he, er, tried to run away.”
Boog pointed silently toward the kitchen. Wolfhorn walked around behind the bar and vanished into the kitchen, returning shortly thereafter, her nose wrinkled. “You two did that?”
“No,” said Boog. “He did that all by himself.”
After some discussion, Boog and I agreed that we were done at the Swan, but we needed Stennis’ remains collected for the Augur back at headquarters. Wolfhorn gave a short whistle and summoned a spindly lad over. He looked a bit silly in his ill-fitting shiny cha
in mail and carrying his big sword, but he had an honest, open look about him. I did not envy him the remainder of his evening.
As he left for the kitchen, a linen sack in his hand and his face full of misgivings, we headed for the front door. I requested an escort, given the amount of gold we were carrying, and Wolfhorn provided us with two guards, a burly fellow who smelled a bit off and a fierce-looking woman with an intricately scarred cheek.
I suddenly remembered something. I walked over to the bar, reached behind, and grabbed the glass and the bottle of wine the wizard had used. “Ah, for an augury!” said Boog. “Good thinking.”
On our way out, a thin-lipped old woman suddenly rose from her stool and grabbed my arm. I gave a little yell, but it soon became clear she was pretty deep into her cups. And she had a lot of cups. I recovered my composure, and Boog shook his head sadly, his eyes casting skyward. The woman leaned close to me.
“I’ve heard of that symbol – the moon and sun,” she rasped. "My grandfather told me. His sister killed her family, her children. The blood…everywhere…” She paused, lost in memory or in the ale. “Beware, son. Beware of…” She sank back into her chair and closed her eyes. I waited a bit, but she remained silent. What further dire warnings would she offer? Boog tapped her on her shoulder, and the woman slumped over onto the table, snoring loudly. I stood there, lost in ominous thought.
“Boo,” said Boog, poking me in the back. I flinched again.
3
Heavy Wait
Early the following morning, Boog and I sat in uncomfortable silence outside the door of our superior, the High Inquisitor, Sophie Borchard. I looked up at the large map of the city on the wall. It showed all the incidents investigated by the Inquisitor’s Guild in the current month. There was a small flag (black, for theft) sticking out at the site of the jewel robbery. The case number there would allow an inspector to locate all the relevant information – Countess Moriff’s initial report, the augury results, and our notes on Stennis.
I saw that our recent adventure at the Sotted Swan had been marked overnight. The new flag showed the same case number. A junior clerk had taken our testimony in excruciating detail upon our return. The Guild’s clerks were extremely efficient, often annoyingly so. The flag was orange, for "miscellaneous incident.” It was somehow comforting to me that the clerks didn’t have a specific color for exploding swordsmen.
Boog blew air up his face, making his short brown hair lift in the breeze. The cut on his forehead was still crusty with dried blood, but he didn’t seem bothered by it. He studied a grubby fingernail, then spoke. “Think she’ll pull us off the case?”
I pondered this. I should confess – we were men of very little importance. We were provisional inspectors, in the second month of service following five years of training, both of us merely eighteen years old. It was hard to see how Sophie would consider this a successful investigation, and we didn’t have a long history of clever sleuthing and glorious arrests to fall back on. I was surprised that we got the case at all, considering the rank of the noble involved.
The heavy door creaked open. I wasn’t sure what or who had kept us waiting. It turned out to be one of our fellow provisionals, Gueran Declais, who strode out as if he were a hero in a play, off to storm a castle or climb a mountain or achieve some similar feat of dauntless prowess. I wondered if his eyebrows were naturally so high on his forehead, or if he had to remember to keep them raised all the time around his perceived inferiors.
“Ho, there, Marten,” called Gueran, turning to me. My, someone who actually says ‘Ho, there,’ I thought. “I understand you had a bad night. Blew one up and lost the other. Nice work.” His sneer was quite polished, no doubt from heavy use.
I struggled mightily to keep a straight face, because Boog, unseen behind Gueran, was noiselessly aping his words and accompanying them with elaborate hand gestures. “Well, Gueran, we can’t all be as daring and talented as you," I replied, muffling a snort with my fist.
Gueran tipped back his head and gave a sardonic laugh, which Boog mimicked silently but with great flair. “Well, better luck next time. I’m off to wrap up the murder case I’ve been working on. A tricky one, too, but I’ve got my man. And he’s alive in a cell, not in pieces in a seedy tavern somewhere.” Gueran resumed his striding. I wished heartily that he would trip and fall as he made his exit, but my luck isn’t that good.
Gueran came from a minor noble family, a third child, but that put him far above the rest of us in the social hierarchy of Frosthelm. He made sure none of us forgot this, talking frequently about his days at court functions, or his servants at home, or the soirées he attended, or his highly placed sources of gossip and information. I considered it one of the major disappointments in my life that he actually turned out to be a very good student –– one of four (out of the initial group of thirty selected five and a half years before) to be named inspectors after the long training period. It was also disappointing that he was dashingly handsome – strong and graceful, with jet-black hair and pale blue eyes. A wart, an ugly birthmark, a hint of pox, or maybe even just bristly nose hair would have gone a long way toward consoling me, but alas – no luck at all.
Clarice Jerreau emerged from Sophie’s office now. She smiled faintly at us and followed Gueran out the door. I didn’t know how she could stand working with him without killing him or at least causing him severe bodily harm. Perhaps she was just immune to his abrasiveness. Despite five years of training, eating, and working with her, I knew nearly nothing about her background or family, other than that she had an uncle who was an Inquisitor – she’d mentioned that once, in passing. But her position came in no way from nepotism. She was very, very clever, and she missed no detail or clue in studying the scene of a crime, poring over information in the library, or questioning a witness or a suspected criminal.
She and I had been the quickest to learn the bits of magical lore we were taught, as well. It was just we two of all the students who had been able to get the warding rods to function. Only a small number of inspectors currently in the Guild, including even the most senior, had mastered the rods, maybe ten in all, including Clarice and me. These devices were centuries old, crafted for the Guild by a forgotten wizard in a time long past, the records of their origin lost or destroyed. The source of the rods’ power was likewise mysterious. No modern scholar could produce such a device, though several had studied them closely. Nonetheless, the Guild had several written guidebooks (often conflicting) and knowledge passed from old inquisitors to new.
For me and Clarice, and the others who could use them, the rods were often very effective at turning violent situations calm and protecting us from harm without hurting those we sought to arrest. I had loved studying with Clarice. After the other students had tried and failed, we’d trained together for a couple of months under the less-than-watchful eye of Inspector Surrey, who would rather read books than speak with us. It was over that time that I’d gotten to know Clarice a little better, and when I think I could say we’d become friends. She loved reading and studying history and politics, and she often shared with me tidbits that she'd discovered while reading in the Guild library, which is where she spent most of her limited time off. She knew more about Frosthelm’s past rulers than anyone in the Guild, I’d guess, even our instructors. She also had a love of spicy Turzek food, and we’d stolen out occasionally to the southern market where an immigrant family had a stall.
I would be remiss not to mention that Clarice was beautiful, too – deep red-brown hair over creamy skin, green eyes, with just enough freckles. I’d been smitten from the day I met her, although I suspected this was unrealistic on my part. Gueran made some gallant advances toward Clarice during training, but she rebuffed him, gently but firmly, just as she did the others who tried. I suspected she was either uninterested or that she might even have a paramour she met when off work, although she never spoke of this. I envied this imaginary person and wished upon him or her all manner of ills.
>
All in all, I considered myself very lucky to have been partnered with Boog. He and I had become fast friends during training, rather improbably, I thought, but we complemented each other very well. He was strong, menacing, and skilled with weapons, while I was none of those things, although I’d worked hard to better myself with the dagger and short blade. Boog was huge, too –– easily the tallest and strongest at the Inquisitor’s School, a good foot and a half taller than I was and almost twice as heavy. He wasn’t exactly handsome, with short, ruffled brown hair and a number of scars from a rough childhood in the poor neighborhoods near Beggar’s Row, but this weathered appearance often helped him avoid conflict and loosen tongues. Befriending him had greatly reduced the number of times I was beaten up during our training.
Boog was also quite clever. He was quick on the uptake, intuitive, and full of humor. The only subjects he’d had trouble with were those at which I excelled – languages, including the Argot, research, infiltration, picking locks, and magic. During school, we'd train each other, with me helping him through long nights in the library, and him leaving me bruised and limping in the weapons hall. Mistress Fennick, our combat instructor, loved to pattern our exercises and maneuvers after the natural world. One day, after Boog and I had performed Snake Takes Mouse and Crab’s Choice with uncharacteristic grace, Fennick had paid me her greatest compliment ever. “Mingenstern,” she said. “It’s possible you won’t die as young as I thought.”
Yes, I owed Boog a great deal. I don’t think I’d have made it through the School, much less have been selected as a provisional inspector, without him at my side. But he had a sharpness about him, sometimes, too. He was at times quick with a cutting remark, though usually meant as a joke, and he was willing to use his strength and size to get what he needed or wanted. But he was a genuinely good person, with a well-developed sense of justice, and as loyal to his friends and to the Guild as I was. With his help, I had already grown in confidence, although I’d likely never have his presence or command of a room.